Donald Trump on Energy & Oil

Establish panel devoted to challenging climate science

The environmental group 350 Action released a candidate scorecard known as the 2020 Climate Test to assess presidential hopefuls on three major metrics: support for a Green New Deal, opposition to new fossil fuel development and refusal to accept money
from energy companies.

Trump is the only Republican listed; he failed all three tests. On the Democratic side, 2020 candidates have for the most part indicated support for environmental policies, though some appear more willing
to acknowledge the seriousness of the situation than others.

Despite public sentiment [in favor of climate action], Trump and his administration have maintained a firm anti-environment agenda.
The president regularly mocks the idea of climate change on Twitter, and the White House is planning to set up a panel devoted to challenging the science behind the phenomenon that includes an avowed climate skeptic.

FactCheck: US has been #1 producer of oil & gas since 2013

President Trump said in the 2019 State of the Union address, "We have unleashed a revolution in American energy--the United States is now the No. 1 producer of oil and natural gas in the world."

THE FACTS:
That depends on what the definition of "we" is. His claim is true in the unlikely event he was also crediting Obama and other recent presidents who were aggressive about energy production.
The government says the U.S. became the world's top natural gas producer in 2013, under the Obama administration.

The U.S. now leads the world in oil production, too, under Trump. That's largely because of a boom in production from shale oil, which also began under Obama.

Net exporter for the first time in 65 years

My Administration has cut more regulations in a short time than any other administration during its entire tenure. Companies are coming back to our country in large numbers thanks to historic reductions in taxes and regulations.

We have unleashed a revolution in American energy--the United States is now the number one producer of oil and natural gas in the world. And now, for the first time in 65 years, we are a net exporter of energy.

Source: 2019 State of the Union address to United States Congress
, Feb 5, 2019

Climate change isn't a hoax, but don't spend trillions on it

President Trump is backing off his claim that climate change is a hoax but says he doesn't know if it's manmade. Trump said he doesn't want to put the US at a disadvantage in responding to climate change: "I think something's happening. Something's
changing and it'll change back again," he said. "I don't think it's a hoax. I think there's probably a difference. But I don't know that it's manmade. I will say this: I don't want to give trillions & trillions of dollars. I don't want to lose millions
& millions of jobs."

Trump called climate change a hoax in November 2012 stating, "The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive." He later said he was joking about the Chinese
connection, but in years since continued to call global warming a hoax.

As far as climate "changing back," temperature records kept by NASA show that the world hasn't had a cooler-than-average year since 1976 or a cooler-than-normal month since 1985.

End war on coal: it's important for our defense

We have ended the war on American energy, we were in war. And we have ended the war on beautiful, clean, coal, one of our great natural resources. Very important for our defense, coal, very important for our defense, because we have it. We don't have to
send it through pipes, we don't have to get it from foreign countries. We have more than anybody. And they wanted to end it, and our miners have been mistreated and are not being mistreated anymore. We're doing tremendous business.

Source: Vox.com blog, "Trump at CPAC 2018"
, Feb 23, 2018

End the war on beautiful clean coal

In our drive to make Washington accountable, we have eliminated more regulations in our first year than any administration in history.
We have ended the war on American Energy -- and we have ended the war on beautiful clean coal. We are now an exporter of energy to the world.

Source: 2018 State of the Union address
, Jan 30, 2018

Withdraw from Paris Agreement, to put America first

Q: On the Paris climate agreement: Pres. Trump said this on the decision to withdraw from the agreement:

(VIDEO CLIP) TRUMP: The Paris agreement handicaps the United States' economy in order to win praise from the very foreign capitals and global
activists that have long sought to gain wealth at our country's expense. They don't put America first. I do, and I always will.

(END VIDEO) Q: And here's the argument by the EPA administrator:

(VIDEO CLIP) SCOTT PRUITT: It is a failed deal to
begin with. And even if all of the targets were met by all nations across the globe, it only reduced the temperature by less than two-tenths of one degree.

(END VIDEO) Q [to former V.P. Al Gore]: Less than two-tenths of one degree, President Trump
made a similar argument.

GORE: Well, first of all, it's not true. Things take longer to happen than you think they will, and then they happen much faster than you thought they could.

Represent Pittsburgh, not Paris: Coal over climate agreement

As he announced his decision to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, President Trump said he was putting American jobs ahead of the needs of other countries. "I was elected to represent the citizens of Pittsburgh, not Paris," he said, claiming
that as a result of this action, "The coal mines are starting to open up. For many, many years that hasn't happened." Is that true?

Short Answer: Yes, mines are opening, including a new one in Pennsylvania.

Long answer: That doesn't reverse the
overall decline of the coal mining industry from its glory days. The mines that are opening produce a special kind of coal used in steelmaking and are opening largely because of events unrelated to federal policy, experts say. The market for the kind of
coal used in electricity--the biggest use for coal--remains down relative to where it was several years ago. In other words, the industry has rebounded slightly after years of layoffs and closures caused mainly by competition from cheap natural gas.

Revive the coal industry; end efforts to curb carbon

President Trump, flanked by company executives and miners, signed a long-promised executive order to nullify President Barack Obama's climate change efforts and revive the coal industry, effectively ceding American leadership in the international
campaign to curb the dangerous heating of the planet.

Trump made clear that the United States had no intention of meeting the commitments that his predecessor had made to curb planet-warming carbon dioxide pollution, turning denials of climate change
into national policy. Trump directed the Environmental Protection Agency to start the complex and lengthy legal process of withdrawing and rewriting the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, which would have closed hundreds of coal-fired power plants, frozen
construction of new plants and replaced them with vast new wind and solar farms.

"C'mon, fellas. You know what this is? You know what this says?" Trump said to the miners. "You're going back to work."

Stop threatening the livelihood of our coal miners

For every 1 new regulation, 2 old regulations must be eliminated; and stopping a regulation that threatens the future and livelihoods of our great coal miners. We have cleared the way for the construction of the Keystone and
Dakota Access Pipelines--thereby creating tens of thousands of jobs--and I've issued a new directive that new American pipelines be made with American steel.

Source: 2017 State of the Union address to Congress
, Feb 28, 2017

Fracking will lead to American energy independence

Q: Should the United States meet all its energy needs domestically?

Trump writes, "The natural gas reserves we have in the United States could power America's energy needs for the next 110 years," and there is enough crude oil to last for decades.
He supports a dramatic escalation of domestic drilling to provide jobs and minimize dependency on foreign cartels. "Fracking will lead to American energy independence. With price of natural gas continuing to drop, we can be at a tremendous advantage."

Clinton's State Department took steps to try and facilitate the export of hydraulic fracturing technology, to enable allies with promising shale geologies to replicate the U.S. oil and gas production boom; referred
to natural gas as a "bridge fuel" as part of the transition from coal to renewable energy; Her energy diplomacy platform included vocal concern about geopolitical and economic risks driven by climate change. Source

EPA is killing energy companies; 1,000 years of clean coal

Q: What steps will your energy policy take to meet our energy needs, while at the same time remaining environmentally friendly and minimizing job loss for fossil power plant workers? A: The EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, is killing these energy
companies. And foreign companies are now coming in buying our--buying so many of our different plants and then re-jiggering the plant so that they can take care of their oil. I'm all for alternative forms of energy, including wind, including solar,
etc. But we need much more than wind and solar. Clinton wants to put all the miners out of business. There is a thing called clean coal. Coal will last for 1,000 years in this country. Now we have natural gas and so many other things because of
technology. We have found over the last seven years tremendous wealth right under our feet. I will bring our energy companies back. They'll be able to compete. They'll make money. They'll pay off our national debt.

Focus on disease & clean water, not "climate change"

Q: What are your views on climate change?

TRUMP: There is still much that needs to be investigated in the field of "climate change." Perhaps the best use of our limited financial resources should be in dealing with making sure that every person in the
world has clean water. Perhaps we should focus on eliminating lingering diseases around the world like malaria. Perhaps we should focus on efforts to increase food production to keep pace with an ever-growing world population.
Perhaps we should be focused on developing energy sources and power production that alleviates the need for dependence on fossil fuels. We must decide on how best to proceed so that we can make lives better, safer and more prosperous.

CLINTON: When it comes to climate change, the science is crystal clear. Climate change is an urgent threat and a defining challenge of our time.

America invested in solar panels and it was a disaster

CLINTON: Some country is going to be the clean-energy superpower of the 21st century. Donald thinks that climate change is a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese.

TRUMP: I did not--

CLINTON: I think it's real. I think science is real.

TRUMP: I do not
say that.

CLINTON: And I think it's important that we deal with it, both at home & abroad. Here's what we can do. We can deploy a half a billion more solar panels. We can have enough clean energy to power every home. We can build a new modern electric
grid. That's a lot of jobs; that's a lot of new economic activity.

TRUMP: She talks about solar panels. We invested in a solar company, our country. That was a disaster. They lost plenty of money on that one. Now, look, I'm a great believer in all
forms of energy, but we're putting a lot of people out of work. Our energy policies are a disaster. Our country is losing so much in terms of energy, in terms of paying off our debt. You can't do what you're looking to do with $20 trillion in debt.

Green energy is just an expensive feel-good for tree-huggers

There has been a big push to develop alternative forms of energy--so-called green energy--from renewable sources. That's a big mistake. To begin with, the whole push for renewable energy is being driven by the wrong motivation, the mistaken belief that
global climate change is being caused by carbon emissions. If you don't buy that--and I don't--then what we have is really just an expensive way of making the tree-huggers feel good about themselves.

The most popular source of green energy is solar
as several decades after installing solar panels to get your money back. That's not exactly what I would call a good investment. Even if that number is only half right, what kind of investment do you want to make that takes 20 years before you break even

We have 2 trillion barrels of oil; enough for 283 years

Among all the gifts that God gave to America was an abundant supply of natural energy. According to the Department of Energy, the natural gas reserves we have in the ground could supply our energy needs for centuries.

Researchers at Rice University in Houston, Texas, have estimated we might have two trillion barrels of recoverable oil, enough to last the next 285 years.
Technology has changed so much in the last few years that a Goldman-Sachs study has estimated that by 2017 or 2019, we could overtake both Saudi Arabia and Russia to become the world's largest oil producer.

The oil is there for the taking;
we just have to take it.

I've never understood why, with all of our own reserves, we've allowed this country to be held hostage by OPEC, the cartel of oil- producing countries, some of which are hostile to America.

Offered to oversee response to 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill

When Trump spoke about Obama, he sounded personally irritated, which may have been because the White House had ignored his offer to lead the federal response to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill because the admiral in charge "doesn't know what he's
doing." Unfortunately Obama's former senior adviser David Axelrod had revealed this exchange, and Trump's offer to build a ballroom at the White House, after Donald stopped speaking to me, which made it impossible to follow up on it with him.

Wind energy projects are industrial monstrosities

As earthmoving machines broke the land to create the first of Trump's two planned golf courses, the housing market in Scotland and the rest of Europe remained weak.

Trump continued to complain about the wind-energy project planned for the waters just offshore. The British government was committed to the idea, and Scottish first minister Salmond had worked hard to get the
European Union's approval for a wind- energy test field in the North Sea waters. Trump said that Salmond had assured him the windmills would not be built. He insisted that he was fighting not just for himself, but
for the country, because windmills were a bad technology. "We have to save Scotland," he declared. "You cannot allow these industrial monstrosities sustained with government subsidy."

Windmills are destroying shorelines all over the world

In March 2012, Trump said, "Right now, green energy is way behind the times. You look at the windmills that are destroying shorelines all over the world.
Economically, they're not good. It's a very, very poor form of energy."

Trump's opinion of windpower stems from an unsuccessful legal battle he has fought against an off-shore windpower project near one of his golf resorts in Scotland.
Just last month, Scottish courts found that Trump had no grounds for accusing Scottish ministers of illegally agreeing to license the 100MW experimental wind farm.

Solar hasn't caught on because it has a 32-year payback

In March 2012, Trump said, "Solar hasn't caught on because it's a 32-year payback. Who wants a 32-year payback? The fact is, the technology is not there yet. Wind farms are hurting the country."

Trump has simply dismissed solar as an "unproven technology" despite solar's decades of rock-solid reliability. His 32 year payback assessment, even in 2012, did not take into account any of the tax incentives or rebates available to most Americans.
One can only assume that his criticisms of the government tax breaks for solar are strictly political in motivation, since his real estate empire is built
on the hundred of millions of dollars of taxpayer subsidies his projects receive.

Maybe some climate change is manmade, but not all

A: Well, there could be some manmade, too. I mean, I'm not saying there's zero, but not nearly to the extent [others say]. When Obama gets up and said it's
the number one problem of our country--and, if it is, why is it that we have to clean up our factories now, and China doesn't have to do it for another 30 or 35 years in their wonderful agreement, you know, our wonderful negotiators?

Climate change is a hoax

What does Donald Trump believe? Climate Change: It is a hoax.

Trump does not believe climate change is real, tweeting out his skepticism with strong language and calling it a hoax on Fox News in 2014. In a 2012 Twitter post which is no longer
accessible, Trump charged that the concept of climate change was created by the Chinese to suppress the U.S. economy. In addition, Trump has expressed firm opposition to wind turbines, which he sees as an environmental and aesthetic problem.

Source: PBS News Hour "2016 Candidate Stands" series
, Jun 16, 2015

No Cap-and-Tax: oil is this country's lifeblood

As crazy as it sounds, the Obama administration wants higher energy prices because they believe that will force America to drive less and businesses to slow down on production and transportation.

Remember Cap-and-Tax (or as they called it Cap and
Trade)? [In 2008], Obama outright admitted that his plan to tax businesses on carbon emissions that exceeded his arbitrary cap would drive energy prices sky high. Here's what he said:

"Under my plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates would
necessarily skyrocket, even regardless of what I say about coal, because I'm capping greenhouse gases. Whatever the plants were, they would have to retrofit their operations. That will cost money. They will pass that on to consumers."

Most of us shake
our heads in disbelief at this stuff.

Until we get this country's lifeblood--oil--back down to reasonable rates, America's economy will continue to slump, jobs won't get created, and American consumers will face ever-increasing prices.

Jobs will slump until our lifeblood--oil--is cheap again

Until we get this country's lifeblood--oil--back down to reasonable rates, America's economy will continue to slump, jobs won't get created, and American consumers will face ever-rising prices.

Obama promised he was going to create millions of
so-called "green collar" jobs. He used that promise to justify his massive government giveaway of billions and billions of taxpayers' dollars to green energy companies. We're now seeing the results of Obama's promise and big government scheme.

Source: Time to Get Tough, by Donald Trump, p. 16-17
, Dec 5, 2011

Enough natural gas in Marcellus Shale for 110 year supply

Did you know that with the natural gas reserves we have in the United States we could power America's energy needs for the next 110 years? Those aren't my estimations, that's what the
United States Energy Department's Energy Information Administration says. In fact, one of the largest mother lodes of natural gas, the Marcellus Shale, could produce the energy equivalent of 87 billion barrels of oil.
Some critics believe those numbers might be inflated. Fine. Let's say the real number is fifty-five years of energy. Or that we only get 43 billion barrels' worth of energy.
So what? That buys us more time to innovate and develop newer, more efficient, cleaner, and cheaper forms of energy.

Libya: No oil, no support; no exceptions

Qadaffi is dead and gone. So what? We have spent more than $1 billion on the Libya operation. And what are we getting in return? A huge bill, that's what. It's incredible how foolish the Obama administration is. Libya has enormous oil reserves.
When the so-called "rebels" came to NATO (which is really the U.S.) and asked for help to defeat Qadaffi, we should have said, "Sure, we don't like the guy either. We will help you take out Qadaffi.
But in exchange, you give us 50 percent of your oil for the next twenty-five years to pay for our military support and to say thank you for the United States doing what you could never have done on your own."
The "rebels" would have jumped at the offer and said yes.

Imagine the amount of oil we could have secured for America. Our policy should be: no oil, no military support.

It's incredible how slowly we're drilling for oil

[Saudi Arabia and OPEC] are absolutely salivating. Now who knows how long they're going to be around. They are only there because of us. It always amazes me when they raise the price. Nobody ever talks to them, nobody ever says no, you're not going to
do this.

It's not the market [raising the price], it's OPEC. They set the price of oil. If they did it in this country, it would be called illegal.

there are always going to be problems. You're going to have an oil spill. You clean it up and you fix it up and it'll be fine.

I have people in the business and they say it's almost impossible to
get a permit to drill. So you can imagine how hard it is to get nuclear and other things but they say it's almost impossible. If you look at natural gas, we're the Saudi Arabia times 100 of natural gas--but we don't use it.

Source: Devonia Smith Political Transcripts Examiner
, Mar 16, 2011

We need nuclear energy, and we need a lot of it fast

Q: What about the Japan nuclear crisis resulting from the earthquake & tsunami?

A: Ultimately what could happen to nuclear energy in terms of a worldwide feeling, is not a good thing.

Q: Are we overreacting? Germany sidelining some nuclear reactors?

A: When you see what's going on in Japan, certainly you can't say overreacting, but, look, nuclear is a way that we get what we have to get, which is energy. I think that probably there's not an overreaction, but we have to be very, very careful.
I worry about terrorists. I worry about other things beyond just that. I'm very strongly in favor of nuclear energy. You know, it's sort of interesting. If a plane goes down, people keep flying. If you get into an auto crash, people keep driving.
There are problems in life. Not everything is so perfect. You have to look very carefully, though, at really taking care; having the best people in terms of safeguards for nuclear energy. But we do need nuclear energy, and we need a lot of it fast.

Source: Interview on Your World with Neil Cavuto
, Mar 15, 2011

Oil is the lifeblood of all economies

September 15, 2008 was the worst day on Wall Street since right after the 9/11 attacks, with a fallout of some financial giants that we thought were untouchable. [But] we survived and prospered after 9/11, and we will do the same this time.

Here are some points to consider. The price of oil, which is the lifeblood of all economies, is down. That's good news. I've already written about that subject and about the many tankers full of oil treading water and going nowhere.

Green buildings take 40 years to get investment back

Q: What do you think about green buildings? A fad or the future?

DT: I'm doing one right now. I'm doing this huge complex in Jones Beach in coordination with the State of New York. It's on the ocean and it's going to be great. I made a deal to
build a regular building and all of a sudden the state wants me to do a green building. I could have challenged them, because I have my long- term lease. A new commissioner came in and just wanted a green building. It's much more expensive.
The science has not been perfected yet and in some cases the savings cannot justify the huge cost. You spend a tremendous amount of money now, and it takes 40 years to get your money back. Even with the tax breaks it doesn't work financially.
For example, if I use solar, I get my money back with the tax breaks in 12 years. It's a very hard thing to justify in terms of real estate right now. It's a long, long time before you get your money back. I think that will get better with technology.

Expand sales of corn ethanol year-round to 15%

President Donald Trump has ordered the EPA to expand sales of corn ethanol, delivering a gift to farm state Republicans a month before the midterm elections. The move ends months of bitter behind-the-scenes fighting between corn backers and the
oil industry over Trump's calls to increase ethanol sales.

Trump, a vocal supporter of corn ethanol, will order EPA to allow year-round sales of gasoline with 15% ethanol content, an increase over the 10% blends that are sold at most gas stations
around the nation. The sale of the blends, known as "E15," is currently prohibited during the summer months in several states because of Clean Air Act restrictions, and corn growers have long sought to expand sales of the higher concentrations.

Trump has previously called for increased sales of ethanol, which consumes about 40% of the US corn crop. He strongly backed the biofuel during the 2016 campaign, a stance that appealed to Midwestern farmers, but which the oil industry staunchly opposed.